May 21: "Carol" Dip Monday, Publishing My Book, Contests

Welcome to Carol dip Monday.  Yes, this is the day where I ask a completely self-absorbed question about my life, flip randomly through my copy of A Christmas Carol, and land on a quote that answers my question.  Think of it as the Magic 8 Ball of literary analysis.  It has nothing to do with the artistic merits of Charles Dickens or the book, and everything to do with my ego.  If you are looking for profound insight in this post, you have come to the wrong blog.

With that little disclaimer out of the way, I shall proceed.  My question for today is about my latest collection of poems that I've been sending out to contests for the last year.  (I'm currently waiting to hear back from yet another competition.)  My question is very simple:

Will I get that book published soon?

And the answer from the book of Dickens is:

The joy, and gratitude, and ecstasy!  They are all indescribable alike

I kid you not.  That is exactly where my finger stopped, randomly, in the pages of A Christmas Carol.  It's a description of Belle, Scrooge's former fiance, and Belle's children.  It's a bright little passage, and it provides me with a very positive answer to my question this morning.  Joy.  Gratitude.  Ecstasy.  Either I'm going to win that poetry contest, or the university is going to offer me a full-time, tenure-track professor position with benefits.  Soon.  Or maybe a distant relative is going to die and bequeath me a small (or large) fortune.  Soon.  Whatever.  It's a win-win all 'round.

That puts me in a good mood.  It may be silly to base my happiness on a superstitious ritual that has absolutely no connection to reality, but I'm going to run with it this morning.

Saint Marty is in for a whole lot of happy, happy, joy, joy, to quote Ren and Stimpy.

Sing along, if you want!